


Rose and Joe

by asparagusmama



Category: Lewis (TV)
Genre: Community:lewis_challenge, Gen, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-18
Updated: 2011-09-18
Packaged: 2017-10-23 20:47:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,316
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/254821
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/asparagusmama/pseuds/asparagusmama
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>My daughter wanted me to get James back to his estranged mother, but when I began to write this appeared. Besides, The Oxford Ripper was already long enough! This is deleted from the last chapter, so if you haven't read my fan novel and want to, then this will seriously spoil it, so don't bother.</p><p>Alternatively, if a slash novel with crime plot isn't your bag, or you've already read The Oxford Ripper, then I introduce James' parents.</p><p>Also known as Oxford Ripper - deleted scene</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rose and Joe

**Author's Note:**

  * For [babyklingon](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=babyklingon).



> Usual disclaimers, Robert Lewis created by Colin Dexter and belongs to ITV. this version of James Hathaway's parents belong to me, they are the same creation in An Arrest.

As soon as James was asleep with the sleeping pill Laura had ‘prescribed’ she turned to Robbie,

“Get going then.”

“Where, Laura? I thought I was staying too.”

“You know where his family is.”

“Aye, but...”

“Get his mother.”

“What? You heard him...”

“He needs her. There’s unresolved stuff and this could resolve it. Go on, show your card, bring her here.”

“I don’t think that would be a...”

“Well, I do, and so does his counsellor. Go Robbie. Now!”

Laura Hobson had always been a little scary when she lost her temper. Robbie Lewis went.

 

Rose Hathaway was surprised to hear the doorbell. No one called this time of night. No one ever popped by, except her brother-in-law and sisters, but never in the evening.

She opened the door a crack, keeping the chain on. A rather rumbled older man stood in the door. He smiled a polite, business like smile and held up a small wallet containing ID.

“Mrs Hathaway? I’m Detective Inspector Lewis. Can I come in for a bit?”

“Is it Joe? My husband? Is he... has he...?” had an accident? Car crash? Or got arrested in a drunken brawl, she wondered. No, the police never told her when they picked him up and if they did, it wouldn’t be a high-ranking officer from CID, nor would they if they’d come to tell him is Joe was hurt or even... “Oh my God! It’s James! Is he... oh God, sweet Jesus, my baby, he... he’s...”

“Alive and well, well alive and unharmed and asleep, well is a relative thing. Can I come in?”

“Um. Yeah. Of course.” She closed the door and reopened it fully, gesturing for Lewis to come in. If it was a crumbling, dilapidated ruin of a cottage on the outside, it was nothing to inside, damp and mould on the walls, ancient, battered cheap furniture. Clean though, and tidy. Very ordered.

“Come into the kitchen, I was cooking tea. Can I get you a cup of tea? I’ve just made myself a pot.”

“Thank you, that’ll be nice.” Tea not dinner, Lewis noticed. That posh public schooling of his making gaps with his parents, he supposed. Chasms.

She was quite tall and very thin, and blonde streaked with grey, dressed in jeans and a tight tee shirt, a fluffy pink cardigan over the top, the echoes of an almost healed black eye on the right. She also appeared to be younger then himself, which was a bit of a kick in the gut, considering what he was considering...

Lewis sat down at the table and looked about the ordered, tidy, clean kitchen. The smell of something incredibly nice wafted from the cooker. On the old fashioned dresser he saw a picture of young James in school uniform, in fact, several pictures, but Lewis’ eye was particularly drawn to a young man in the attire of a priest – or priest in training, he supposed. He stood and went over, to get a better look. Once there he was distracted by another two picture of James, one that was obviously his graduation photo and then another with James looking sweaty and exhilarated among others looking equally triumphant and exhausted, presumable having just one the boat race.

“This’ll be when he won the Oxford-Cambridge...”

“Why are you here Inspector?” Rose asked abruptly.

“James needs you.”

“Then why isn’t he here to tell me?”

“He’s... he’s... I’m his boss. Well, more than his boss.”

Rose poured the tea and pointed to the chair. Lewis sat again.

“Is he hurt?”

“Not physically. He had been, and in hospital, and was only just back at work when this happened.”

“When what happened?”

“How much do you know about James?”

“I’m his mother,” Rose countered, angrily.

“Did you know he was... Had he told you...?” Lewis floundered.

“Gay? He didn’t really need to tell me, nor that he’s in love with you. I don’t see him very often, but you are all he talks about. Not quite what I imagined, really.”

Lewis felt himself colour. “He’s never given me any indication that he...” Or had he? “Your son is very hard to read.”

“He locks everything away. We do that in our family, too much locked in the dark, too dark to let out in the light. He thinks I’d condemn him; take the usual Catholic line. But I wouldn’t, but he’s never given me a chance. Why are you here Inspector?”

“Robbie, please.”

“Why are you here... Robbie?”

“James needs you.”

“He doesn’t know you’re here. He didn’t send you.” These were definite statements, not questions.

“Did you hear the news today, the captain killed in Afghanistan, the one with medals and that, the Ghanaian one?”

“Something, there are so many tragic deaths. What had that got to do with...?” She stared at Lewis. “James’ boyfriend?”

“A bloody awful, married one who’s been beating him up, put him in hospital, but now he’s dead, and James had to hear it on the radio because he’s not next of kin, because he was a married bastard’s bit on the side.”

“Where is he?”

“My friend’s house. Asleep on her sofa, it was her – Laura’s idea. But he needs you, Mrs Hathaway. I think he’s always needed you.”

Rose held her chin up in a very familiar defiant gesture. “He’s always had me. He chose not to visit, or to phone.”

“And why do you think that is?”

“I have no idea.”

“You could have just taken him, you and him, and ran.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I know, okay? I know. Not only did I arrest Mortmaigne but I was DCI Morse’s sergeant, alright? We arrested your husband back in ’94. Okay. We have no evidence so we had to release him, but we knew, okay?”

“What could I do?”

“Leave him. Take your little boy and run. That’s what you should have done.”

“Get out! Get out of my house. You have no right to come here and judge me!” she stood up. “I love my son, I did what was best, but where could I go, Joe would have found us. Besides, I love him, I really...”

Rose was cut off by an man shouting from the door, “What’s all this? Rose! Wha’s the ma’er?” A man came running into the kitchen and instantly raised his fist. Lewis caught the man by his wrist and twisted.

“Police, Mr Hathaway, so think again, alright?”

“Police?”

“Inspector Lewis.” He released James’ father.

Joe looked at Rose. “My Jamie’s boyfriend? Him? He’s older than us!”

Rose went pink. “I was wrong,” she said.

“Oh. Sorry,” he said to Lewis, who was also rather pink. “Is he alright?” his face paled as a thought entered his drunken mind. “He’s... he’s not dead?”

“No.”

“Thank Christ for that!”

“You can go now Inspector.”

“Think about it. Letting him know you know, that you’re okay, would be a start.”

“Jamie don’t want nothing more to do with us, ashamed of us he is, with all his posh school and Cambridge and Oxford friends.”

“My husband’s right, if he wanted to see us he would. If he needed me he’d call. I’ll see you out. Be a minute Joe, tea’s done. Wash your hands and I’ll be right back.”

Rose walked Lewis down the garden to his car. “How long was he with him? Did he know he was married? Did he beat him badly?” she asked, all in a rush.

“Three months, not at first, he beat him and I think he raped him. He was in hospital for damage –” Lewis wrinkled his nose “- down below. Broken bones too. Bruises all the bloody time. Learnt behaviour, isn’t is Mrs Hathaway?” He got into his car.

“Wait!”

“Yes?”

“Tell him I love him.”

“No. You can tell him that yourself.” Lewis slammed the door and accelerated away. Poor James!


End file.
